BEIJING, CHINA – Bacon-wrapped bananas are a popular Hawaiian-style appetizer taking the world by storm— receiving 4 stars on allrecipes.com. This may have also served as an inspiration to scientist Rui Fu and his associates as they injected pig embryos with monkey stem cells.
On November 28, 2019 Protein & Cell research articles published the results of an experiment led by Rui Fu, Dawei Yu, Jilong Ren and Chongyang Li in which domestic cynomolgus monkey embryonic stem cells (D-ESCs) injected into pig blastocysts. More simply put, stem cells from monkeys were merged into pig embryos in the hopes of producing a monkey-pig chimera. But why?
There are multiple cases in which chimeras are attempted to develop human/human-compatible organs for transplants. The three research groups, out of Beijing, working on this attempt were very specific in their stated goals:
This work will enable developments in xenogeneic organogenesis towards producing tissue-specific functional cells and organs in large animal models via interspecies blastocyst complementation.
Springer Link
The results of this project puzzled scientists. NewScientist reported that 4,000 embryos were implanted. Ten piglets were born. Two were chimeras. Every piglet died in a week. Those that were chimeric only showed between .1% and .01% monkey cell. Results such as this have some in the scientific community questioning the effectiveness of chimera experiments.
[Paul Knoepfler, a Stem cell biologist at the University of California,] isn’t convinced that it will ever be possible to grow organs suitable for transplantation by creating animal-human chimeras. However, it makes sense to continue researching this approach along with others such as tissue engineering, he says.
NewScientist
What do you think? Is the potential success for suitable organs worth the ethical risks of animal experimentation? Let us know your views in the comments below.
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